Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, June 12, 1993 TAG: 9306120033
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But you've probably never seen a pile of concrete this big.
It's out past Dixie Caverns, where Roanoke County is building a dam for its new reservoir.
You better act fast if you want to see it before the concrete sets. The dam has risen to more than half of its ultimate height of 243 feet, and work crews are adding about 3 feet of roller-compacted concrete each day.
Roanoke County will give the general public - and that means you - first chance to see the dam for itself this Sunday with the opening of a public viewing area.
Here's your chance to see history in the making. After all, Spring Hollow Reservoir will be large enough to quench Roanoke County's thirst at least through the year 2040.
That's a long time. Kids graduating from high school this week will be cashing their first pension checks by the time Roanoke County needs another reservoir.
Plus, checking out the dam now will enable you to impress your friends later, when Spring Hollow Reservoir becomes a recreational area with canoes, picnic tables and, perhaps, overnight cabins.
"Yeah," you can say, "I remember this place when it was nothing more than a big hole in the ground."
Here's what you'll see if you make it to the grand opening Sunday:
The hollow itself has been ripped up by bulldozers and dynamite. The landscape is scarred by construction roads that are crawling with rock rigs big enough to squash a Jurassic Park reptile.
Check out the narrow road that makes a six-mile circuit around the rim of the hollow. Now imagine the whole thing filled up with water right up to the circuit road. That's what the future looks like.
Meanwhile, look down in the center of the hollow and you'll see a crater. That's the rock quarry, where crews have blasted away 520,000 tons of gravel that have been packed into the dam.
There's no missing the dam, of course, which from the public observation area looks amazingly like the white tile wall in your shower.
That's because the vertical face of the dam is covered with rectangular concrete panels sheathed in waterproofing plastic. From a distance they look puny, but each panel is 16 feet long and 4 feet wide and weighs 3,500 pounds.
Those two silos on the bluff to the right of the dam are the concrete plant. It blends stone, cement, fly ash and water and spits out a gooey mixture on a series of conveyor belts leading to the dam.
The concrete is dumped on the top of the dam, where a bulldozer equipped with a laser-guided blade spreads it into an even layer. The steamrollers then move in for the kill. The result is a succession of 1-foot-thick layers.
With a good pair of binoculars, you might make out a green and gold emblem on the concrete silo.
PCL.
That stands for PCL Civil Constructors, the main contractor from Tempe, Ariz.
Watching concrete dry.
It sure beats sitting at home and watching the grass grow.
by CNB